A Play on Words
by Loads of Randomness
Summary: While settling into the US Ziva decides that she wants to improve her English. She manages to get involved in a scrabble club formed by other local immigrants including, but not limited to; a very particular Iraqi, a meddling Mexican, two Germans who just want to play the game and a passionate French man. What could go wrong?
1. Prologue

"Drinks tonight, anyone?" Asked Tony, slinging his bag across his back.

Gibbs had actually released them before six for the first time in two weeks. They had finally got a cold case day after two weeks of back to back high-profile cases. Normally, a cold case day would be met with groans but after the *incident* yesterday with that reporter... Well, let's just say that the director was on the rampage. Gibbs had been torn apart twice (not that he was any better, his shouting made the probies scatter) and she had paced through the bullpen five times just to get Gibbs twitching. Ziva didn't even want to know how many cups of coffee he had consumed, she had stopped counting after the seventh (though McGee maintained it was his ninth).

"Anyone?" Tony repeated hopefully.

"Sure, I need one," McGee replied. "Ziva?"

"Not this time. I have other plans," she informed them.

_That _caught Tony's attention. Ziva swore his ears actually perked up.

"Planning on having a bit of fun tonight, Zee-vah?" he teased, going as far to waggle his eyebrows.

"Actually, yes," she said, deliberately misunderstanding him and unable to resist the urge to mess with him she added a coy smile.

"Ooh, who's the lucky guy?"

"A girl," she corrected, leading him on. "Several in fact." She upgraded to a sultry grin for good measure.

She wasn't _exactly _lying…Fakhir and Raphael couldn't make it tonight so it was just the girls this time.

"A-a girl?" he stuttered, eyes wide. He cleared his throat. "Several?"

Now McGee's attention had been caught. His eyes were darting between them curiously but he didn't speak up. Ziva prowled around her partner and got into his personal space.

"Oh yes," she said lowly into the back of his neck. His hairs were standing on end, "We plan to have a lot of…fun tonight."

Tony managed to make a strangled 'eeping' noise, rather like a baby chicken.

"Hey," barked Gibbs, suddenly reappearing with yet another coffee cup in hand (should she drop an anonymous note for Ducky to get him checked?). "I told you all to get out of here."

McGee and Ziva scrambled for the elevator in a whirl of half put on coats and bags.

"Tony?" she called, holding the elevator doors open for him as he was still standing, stunned, in the middle of the bullpen.

"He looks like he needs to be rebooted," McGee whispered to her with a grin, nodding towards Gibbs who was now poised behind him.

Tony noticed the looming shadow of Gibbs before he could receive a headslap (unfortunately) and turned to give him a wide grin.

"See you tomorrow, Boss," he said, darting towards them. "So about these lovely ladies?" he asked as the elevator doors shut and the began their descent.

"Yes, Tony?" she responded with raised eyebrows, wondering how far he would push.

"Um, what all do you get up to?"

"Oh, we play games, mostly," she replied with a knowing look. "We do have a favourite one that we play most often but there are problems."

"Problems?" he asked breathily to McGee's eyeroll.

She nodded, "Yes, we often, how do you say it, get all twisted up?"

Tony made the 'eep' noise again just as they arrived in the parking lot.

"Are you okay Tony? You're looking a little flushed," McGee teased, shifting his bag on his shoulders.

He nodded and ran to his car. She could almost _see _his imaginings trail out from his ears.

"I'll meet you at the bar, McGee," he said distractedly, loading his stuff into his back seat and driving off with a distracted wave.

Sighing and rolling his eyes, McGee turned to her, "It's your fault if he crashes."

"Is it my fault that his mind goes straight to the drains?"

"Gutters," McGee absentmindedly corrected. "And yes." He stared thoughtfully at her for a moment before giving her a smirk of his own, "It's your scrabble night tonight, isn't it?"

"Of course."


	2. Game 1: Some Introductions

It didn't take Ziva long to dump her bag and NCIS issued gun and badge. She was glad she could actually make the game tonight; it had been too long since her last one. She quickly changed out of her work clothes and into something more comfortable. Ziva didn't think Tony believe that she was rushing out to join a scrabble game of all things. To be fair, she couldn't quite believe it herself. Ziva would never have thought that she would find an English word game so much fun.

Thankfully, it was Amelia's turn to host it tonight, she didn't live far from Ziva – about a twenty-minute drive away. Ziva wasn't in the mood to drive across the city after the week she had had. Like she would have had to if Francisca was hosting it. Not that that would have stop the small woman from coming to her flat and physically dragging her to the game. Ziva has learned that you do not cross small, elderly Mexican women. It is not worth it.

Ziva pulled into the driveway. It looked like Liu was already here. She checked her watch and frowned. It wasn't often that the master's student was on time, never mind early. She normally had to be phoned multiple times to prise her had out of a textbook. Ziva was locking her car when two small missiles collided with her.

"Ziva!" the two children chorused, clinging to her leg.

Smiling, she bent down to give them a hug and to surreptitiously try and prise them off.

"Fatima, Chase," she greeted.

"Sha-loom," Chase said with a gap-toothed smile and bouncing on the balls of his feet. "Did I say it right? Did I?"

"It's _shalom_" Fatima interrupted with perfect inflection.

"That's what I said!"

"No, you didn't!"

"I _did_!"

"Chase! Fatima!" came a sharp voice from the front door. "What have your mother and me told you about answering the door by ourselves?"

Ziva grinned at the sight of her heavily pregnant friend. There was a small toddler peering shyly from behind her.

"Not to, Auntie," Chase said sulkily, kicking his feet off the ground.

"But you opened the door, _Um _**[Mom]**," Fatima pointed out, grabbing Ziva's hand and skipping along beside her.

"I'm telling mommy!" came the imperious cry of a slightly taller blonde-haired child, holding the toddler's hand.

"Nuh uh!" Chase declared, darting inside.

"Rolling her eyes at the children, Amina extended her arms for a hug. The two Middle-Eastern women exchanged kisses on each cheek.

"_Masaa' al-khayr _**[Good Evening]**," Amina greeted, opening the door wider so Ziva could enter around her pregnant stomach.

"_Masaa' an-nuur _**[Evening of light]**," Ziva returned with a small grin as they entered the house.

"_Ta'baana _**[Tired]**?" Amina queried, closing the door and taking Ziva's coat.

"Very," Ziva replied, allowing herself to be tugged towards the kitchen by Fatima,

"What did our children do now, Amina?" a curvy blonde woman asked, the toddler ensconced in her arms.

"Ran towards Ziva's moving car to attack her."

"Really?" the woman asked, looking between Fatima and Chase with a raised eyebrow. "Don't Dalton."

The taller blond child stopped pulling faces from behind his mother and pouted.

"Mooooom," he whined.

Fatima and Chase just smiled wide-eyed and ran into the living room. Fatima added a stuck-out tongue for good measure. Dalton gave chase and soon there was a lot of giggles and shrieks coming from the other room.

Looking both exasperated and fond the woman declared, "I'll train my spawn eventually"

"When they are eighteen and leaving home," Amina teased, rubbing her stomach.

Rolling her eyes at the two women, Ziva greeted, "Shalom, Amelia."

The blonde woman, Amelia, pulled her into a hug. She would never understand Americans and their incessant need to touch people.

"Ziva!" she replied, squashing the toddler between them who wailed her displeasure. "Oh, sorry Evie."

Amelia carefully placed her on the floor so she could toddler about. Ziva noticed that Liu was already sitting at the table, shaking the game pieces bag. Liu waved and hid a giggle behind her hands by pretending to cough.

"Just you wait, Liu," Amelia teased. "Soon you'll be married and having kids and you'll have to put up with all of this too. Isn't that right, Amina?"

Amina placed a tray of snacks on the table and dusted her hands off.

"I have no idea what you are talking about," she replied airily. "My Fatima is perfectly behaved until she is a round you infidels."

"Heathen," Amelia slung back absentmindedly with no heat.

It was familiar banter between the two neighbours. They had great respect for each other but they both had teasing personalities.

Liu shook her head dismissively and said, "No, no. I have outlasted my mother and grandmother all the way to America. When I return a get good job in China they will give up."

Ziva exchanged an amused look with Amelia. Liu came from a very traditional family who wanted to see her married off. With her very high grades back in China she had somehow managed to persuade them to let her do her college education here. She had achieved her bachelor's and was now completing a master's, delaying her return for as long as possible.

"You should get a PhD. Stay another decade," Amelia teased.

Liu snorted. "And do more study? No, I will take my chances."

Amina ushered them all into chairs so they could get started for the whole purpose of them all being here.

"Is Francisca not here?" Ziva asked curiously, taking her tiles from Liu.

"I am here," the woman herself announced, bursting through the kitchen door. "Don't worry!"

"We weren't," Amelia said drily, tugging out a chair for the exuberant woman.

"Ah, Amelia, I know you love me very much."

"Maybe."

Everyone sniggered.

Francisca turned up her nose, "You will not "syke" me out, as you say. I am better than that."

"Excuse me, I am the crowning champion," Liu pointed out.

"Don't remind me," Amelia grumbled, tucking her chair into the table. "Beaten by my own language."


	3. Game 1: Gender Confusion

"No, Ziva. You don't stick an 'e' on the end of that," Amelia explained patiently to her Israeli friend who was about to triumphantly set down a tile that would put her in the lead.

Ziva gave her a confused look, as did Francisca.

"But is that not how you spell 'manner'? It is feminine, right?"

Francisca nodded her agreement. Amelia resisted the urge to groan. Explaining how to spell things to the older Spanish woman was never fun.

"English does not have genders, remember?" Liu butted in with a superior look on her face.

Ziva glared at her, Amelia shivered but Liu was unfazed. She supposed that the young girl was used to being glared at at this point, but still! That glare of Ziva's promised pain.

"No, no, no. Ziva is right. It ends in 'a' in Spanish though," said Francisca, wagging a finger at Amelia.

"It also only has one 'n' in Spanish," Amelia pointed out, leaning out of reach of the finger and shook her head. "Either way, Liu is right. English doesn't use genders. Thank God."

Ziva muttered something under her breath but returned her 'e' tile to her rack.

"It doesn't make sense _not_ to have a gender," she complained, annoyed that she had been blocked from getting double points.

"I'm pretty sure most languages don't have genders," Amelia retorted with a frown, unable to actually think of one at the moment.

The American school system really only focused on the romance languages or German, none of which helped the point she was trying to make. Seriously, how was _neuter_ a gender?

"Arabic does," Amina volunteered with an unhelpful grin.

Ziva nodded vigorously and added, "As does Hebrew."

Amelia gaped at them.

"But they're not European languages," she complained.

Ziva snorted and fluttered her hands at the table.

"European languages don't have the monopoly on gender. A lot of languages do."

"Oh yeah? Prove it," Liu challenged, arms crossed.

Amelia smiled gratefully at her. At least _someone_ was on her side and making sense. Even if it was just to put off coming in last place. The student was off her game tonight.

Ziva raised an eyebrow before answering, "Just of the ones that I am fluent in? Eight. Only Turkish and English do not."

There was a "Ha!" heavily implied there.

"That many?" Amina asked, impressed.

"Aren't most of the languages you speak romance languages?" Amelia asked, racking her memory for the answer.

"Only three of them. Hardly a majority," Ziva answered dismissively and narrowed her eyes. "Why?"

Amelia gave her an exasperated look. Only three? Sheesh, Amelia barely knew two languages (did high school Spanish even count?) and Ziva just said "only three" like it was nothing! She supposed for someone who was fluent in ten languages and conversational in God knows how many more, knowing three languages really was nothing.

"It would have been an unfair distribution," she answered with a pout.

Ziva just smirked at her and patted her on the arm in mock sympathy.

"How do you even remember what is what?" Amelia complained. "And how can something like "manner" be feminine anyway?"

"You just learn it," Ziva said with a shrug and then added, "You do have to be careful when translating across. Sometimes genders don't match up."

"People wouldn't notice or care if you used the wrong gender for nouns," Francisca argued. "Verbs and describing words-"

"Adjectives" Amelia helped.

"-Adjectives are more important to get right."

"It would depend on the person," Amina added her two cents. "I had an uncle that would refuse to speak to you if you did not use the correct article."

"That's nuts, having one word for 'the' or 'a' would make everything much easier," Amelia maintained.

"Or just have no word for 'the' at all. Like Russian," Ziva suggested jokily.

Amelia gave her a suspicious look, not convinced if the woman was joking or not.

"That wouldn't help much," said Francesca. "Endings of words are still gender specific."

"True," everyone else agreed with solemn head nods.

"Must be nice to be a polyglot," Amelia muttered

"It gives you a lot more insults to use," Francisca said happily.

Ziva and Liu giggled and nodded their agreement. Amina just rolled her eyes and tutted. Amelia poked her. She wasn't innocent. She might not undertake Arabic but she knew the sound of someone cursing when they stepped on a Lego. Now that response was universal.

"At least English keeps things simple," Amelia bragged, putting her nose in the air.

She got pelted by popcorn from all fronts. Everyone looked outraged. She gave her friends a sheepish look. Not the best thing to say to ESL people or whatever language number English was to Ziva.

"That just means it is unsophisticated," Ziva said.

"Simple," Amelia corrected.

Everyone just gave her another look. None of them would deem English 'simple'.

Amelia quickly reached for the bag of tiles and jiggled it over the game board. She did not need another rant on the complexities of the English language or another argument on adjective order.

"Why don't we get back to the game," she said hurriedly, hoping to distract them.

Thankfully it worked. Everyone was soon back to frowning at their own tiles, Ziva pouting at her 'e'.

"My turn!" Amina said brightly, returning her attention to her own rack of tiles. "Did you lift another three tiles, Ziva?"


	4. Game 1: Victor

"I can't believe I didn't win _again_," Amelia complained loudly, glaring at a triumphant looking Ziva.

Ziva just smiled smugly at her, feeling extremely proud of herself. She hadn't won in such a long time; Liu was normally very good - her memorisation skills far surpassed Ziva's.

"She just knows really strange words," Amina commiserated with her friend, patting her on the arm.

Ziva childishly stuck her tongue out at the two of them as Francisca shook her head disapprovingly at all of them. She never did approve of how competitive the rest of them got. Which was very hypocritical of her because if she got anywhere close to winning, she could, what did Amelia call it, hit talk people like the best of them.

"It wasn't _that_ strange a word," Ziva protested.

That got everyone turning around and giving her a pointed look.

"It _wasn't_!"

"How did you even _know_ the word 'quixotry'?"" Liu demanded, feeling a bit sore that she'd lost her winning streak.

Ziva shrugged and blushed slightly, never really liking her English skills being brought to attention. She didn't really want to admit that when she realised that she was staying in America that she went about trying to memorise all the English she could so she didn't look like an idiot. She knew her English wasn't great so she went a _little_ overboard on the vocabulary.

"What does it even mean?" Francisca wondered out loud, gathering all the pieces together to put them back in the bag.

"A romantic action," Ziva explained automatically, the definition having been on the tip of her tongue it's while time."

"She's right," Amina confirmed, reading out from her phone. "A romantic or quixotic idea or action," a frown appearing between her eyebrows. She looked up, "Well, that doesn't help, what does 'quixotic' mean? Is that how you pronounce it?"

Liu, peered over her should and made an exasperated sound.

"I do not know, English pronounces that 'x' and ''q' letters strangely."

All the foreign-born looked expectantly at Amelia who gave them a shrug of her own.

"Hell, if I know," she replied, looking just as baffled as the rest of them. "Why would a word have the same word in its definition anyway?"

"That always did confuse me," Amina agreed, tapping more on her phone. "I'm going to see if looking for the definition of that gives a straight answer."

Ziva shook her head in exasperation and a little bit of annoyance. Hadn't she just told them the definition?

As the rest of them were obviously side-tracked by the peculiarities of the English language, Ziva decided to finish the tidying up; folding the board and stacking the dishes. She was just closing the lid of the box when her ears caught something. Her head jerked around and she stared at the opposite wall. What on _earth_ was that?

Noticing her odd behaviour, everyone looked at her. Ziva brought a finger up to her lips and made a 'shhhh' sound at them. The noise stopped as suddenly as it started. Now they were all staring at the wall.

"You know what? I don't want to know," said Amelia, sitting back down at the table. "Unless something explodes, I'm ignoring it. Let finish off these cookies I made."

Deciding that that was the best plan of action, the women sat back down. Amelia made some excellent cookies after all.

There was a scuffling sound coming from the door. Then a thud and an indignant squawk. The door wobbled. The scrabble players all exchanged amused looks. Amelia sighed heavily while Amina looked up at the ceiling, as if praying for divine intervention.

Ziva slipped out of her chair and crept over to the door. With a quick flourish she opened it and four small children came tumbling into the room.

"Oww," Fatima complained, rubbing her head.

"Help!" squeaked Chase, he'd somehow managed to land upside-down - feet dangling over his face.

Ziva helped him roll over and pulled him to his feet.

"Thank you," he chirped, giving her his signature beaming smile.

"What are you lot even doing?" Amelia demanded, hands on her hips.

Amina mirrored her, adding a raised eyebrow for good measure.

"Wanted to see if you were done," Fatima said matter-of-factly, brushing herself down.

"And you couldn't just knock?"

"We were being _spies_. Spies don't knock."

Ziva couldn't help but let out a snort at that. Well the little girl wasn't exactly _wrong_.

"Spies!" Evie piped up, waving a pair of kid's sunglasses around as she toddled in.

It looked like the frames had been in a certain little girl's mouth.

"Told you it wouldn't work," Dalton said, poking his head around the doorframe and giving the younger children a triumphant look.

Chase blew a raspberry at his brother while Fatima pulled a face, it turning to a wince as Amina tried to untangle her hair. Amelia gave her sons a warning look. Francisca smiled benevolently at the children; she really did like them. She was the sort of woman who was born to be a grandmother.

"Who won?" Dalton asked.

"Ziva," Amelia grumbled.

"Yay!" the children all cheered.

"Can we have more cookies now?" Fatima asked.

"Yeah, cookies!" Chase agreed, joining his friend to provide more puppy-dog eyes.

They were very effective; it wasn't long until all the children were happily munching on the remains.

"Next week, Ziva?" Amelia said as they all made their goodbyes; things having wrapped up soon after the children re-joined them.

"Yes," Ziva said resolutely. "We aren't on rotation next weekend."

"Perfect. It's at Francisca's house remember."

Ziva nodded her understanding.

"Hopefully some of the boys can join next week," Francisca stated, shrugging into her coat.

"They aren't exactly boys," Amelia told the older woman.

"Bah," she replied dismissively, waving her hand at them. "When you get to my age, everyone is a child."

Liu sniggered at that as she retrieved her backpack before any little sticky fingers could get at it this time. She still hand paint marks from fur games ago when the children had been distracted with painting on easels.

"Until next week, " Ziva said to them all I'm farewell, eventually leaving after several rounds of hugs.

You really think she'd be acclimatised to it due to working with Abby.


	5. Doesn't Make Sense

"How did your Scrabble game go the other night?" McGee asked from the driver's seat.

They had to go and retrieve a witness for their current case from about an hour away. Frustrating, but it had to be done. McGee had somehow managed to lay claim to the keys first (Ziva blamed Tony's deliberate distraction) so she was a passenger.

"It went well," she answered, turning away from the window to look at him. "It was nice catching up with everyone."

"It's kind of cool how you're meeting all these different people," he said eagerly. "You're from all over the world and all so different but yet you get together to play a game of Scrabble."

Ziva smiled at his enthusiasm.

"Is that not what America is meant to be about?" she asked softly.

"I guess it is."

"I like the fact that we don't sound as stupid making mistakes to each other as opposed to at work," Ziva admitted.

"You don't sound stupid..."

Ziva gave him a sidelong look.

"You don't!" McGee insisted. "You normally get the gist right and it's usually funny, not stupid."

"Same thing," Ziva dismissed.

"Not really."

Ziva shrugged, happy to agree to disagree.

"We all seem to try a bit more because there's less embarrassment about not being understood. There's at least five different languages between us-"

"Not if you include all that you speak," McGee muttered.

Ignoring him, Ziva continued, "There's always someone being misunderstood."

"So, the games actually help?" McGee asked curiously.

"Somewhat," Ziva said with a shrug. "Technically English is our common tongue for all of us-"

"-I'm sure you speak everyone's mother tongue," McGee interrupted with a grin.

"Most," she agreed. "But I do not know how much it helps considering that none of us are completely fluent."

"You're basically fluent," McGee pointed out fairly. "It's just idioms and some words that you don't use a lot. So, perfect for Scrabble."

Ziva smiled gratefully at the compliment, she still felt a bit self-conscious about her English every now and then. Some of Tony teasing hit a bit hard every now and then so it was nice to have some encouragement.

"All of us are definitely conversational in English," explained Ziva. "But spelling-"

"Ah," McGee said with a grimace, knowing how frustrating that can be. "How bad is it?"

"Not _that_ bad. But I think we spend more time arguing about spelling than playing sometimes," Ziva admitted ruefully, thinking of the last game. "So many English words look like ones in French or Spanish. It is very frustrating."

"Yeah, English likes to mug other languages and rifle through their pockets for spare vocabulary," McGee said, scrunching up his nose. "An awful lot is borrowed."

"But why change only one or two letters in those words?" Ziva demanded, frowning at the thought of words that replaced c's with t's.

McGee shrugged helplessly.

"That's just how English works."

Ziva muttered something foul in Hebrew. McGee's eyebrows rose in recognition of some of the words. If she wasn't so annoyed at the English language Ziva would be amused that her friend probably knew more Hebrew insults than polite Hebrew. She should probably at least try and teach him other words, but he didn't have a knack for languages like Ziva and even Tony did. Ziva got the impression that he disliked coming across as stupid and leaving himself open to be teased. Understandable.

"Don't get me _started_ on your i's and e's!" she ranted. "Amelia tried to explain the rules and exceptions but she got confused and didn't help our disagreement. We had to resort to a dictionary."

Which was a key part of their necessary equipment. Had been since the whole "independent" argument. Vowels could be so stupid. Hebrew was better in that way. It just didn't use them in writing at all. There was no need for them. Of course, Hebrew did not have words such as bat, bit, but and boat where removing the vowels would just be confusing.

"Native speakers aren't exactly great at those either," McGee admitted.

"So, you could say that not understanding is a sign of fluency?" Ziva asked slyly.

He shook his head and rolled his eyes at her.

"That's not exactly how it works."

"Pity."

They drove in silence for a few miles, enjoying the peace. It really was a nice day and after grabbing this witness, all it should take was their statement and the while case would be closed. They might even get out early!

"It sounds fun though," McGee broke the silence.

"If you don't mind be frustrated every now and then," Ziva agreed. "It's not as peaceful as our games."

McGee snorted, "You call you threatening the game pieces in a multitude of languages and both of us trying to steal the other's letters peaceful?"

"Have you ever heard an angry Spanish woman argue with a Russian?" Ziva demanded with an arched eyebrow.

That was an... interesting evening. She had learnt quite a few new insults that day. In both languages.

McGee's mouth opened then closed again, not a sound escaping.

"That sounds terrifying."

"But you are welcome to join us," Ziva invited, through her chuckles. "I think that you would enjoy their company."

"I'm pretty sure it's immoral for me to join a word game made up of English language learners," McGee said regretfully.

Ziva knew how much he loved playing all sorts of word games, of which scrabble was on top of the list. He could never find people to play consistently with and he disliked playing them online.

"We have two Americans and an English woman," Ziva assured him. "No one will mind if you come as long as you are prepared to get into an argument about the English adding u's everywhere."

McGee snorted at that.

"That sounds...interesting."

"Not as interesting as Pamela's, the English one, rant of the letter z," said Ziva. "Apparently you Americans have an issue with it."

**AN: In an effort for me to not accidentally abnadon any of my stories anyone who reviews gets a preview of the next chapter.**


	6. Game 2: What is Better?

"Ah, Ziva!" Her name was all but shouted as she was engulfed in a large hug and two wet kisses were smacked noisily on each cheek.

Returning the kisses, Ziva laughed - shaking her head instead of returning the greeting.

"Do you _have_ to be a walking, talking stereotype?" Amelia demanded.

Ziva was released from the hug and the man turned to give Amelia an imperious sniff.

"Eet iz not a stereotype if this iz how I am speaking."

Ziva shuddered.

"That was awful, Raphael," she told the man.

"Truly," Amelia added, rolling her eyes. "Please don't tell me you talk like that at work."

"Sometimes," Raphael said with a shrug, straightening his jacket. "For the new interns."

The two women gave him an exasperated look.

"Hey!" he said defensively in only slightly accented English. "It is not my problem if that is their misconception about French people. And what is the point of being a designer if you can't mess with the interns?"

"He apparently got one of them thinking he couldn't speak English for three weeks," Amelia told her.

"I've done that too," Ziva told Raphael. "It's fun."

Raphael grinned and nodded.

"With Hebrew?" Amelia asked curiously.

"No, French," Ziva corrected.

"Why?" the American spluttered incredulously.

Ziva just smiled enigmatically at her. Technically, that was classified information. She had used that technique to gain access to a secure building to "scope it out" for Mossad. It had worked too. Not many people thought a woman rambling helplessly in one language was of any threat.

"You know you are ridiculous, right?" Amelia told them exasperatedly.

"Ma cherie, she is just jealous of out fabulous fashion sense, non?" Raphael declared, wrapping an arm around Ziva's shoulders.

She resisted the urge to flip him on his back, her mind saw that movement as a threat.

"I don't think mine is on par with yours," she said drily, looking down at their outfits.

She was in her comfy jeans and a long-sleeved t-shirt. Raphael, on the other hand, was sporting a sports jacket over a blue button up (top button undone) and smart pants, finished off with a stylish scarf.

He brushed her off, "We are still fabulous."

Amelia was about to give them a scathing reply when Francisca shooed them into her living room, scolding them in Spanish for letting a draft in.

"Ah, bonjour, Francisca," Raphael greeted their host with a big smile. "You know I do not understand that charming language of yours."

Ziva sighed, oh, not this again. The older woman looked at him up and down and sniffed.

"Do not talk to me of understanding languages. At least mine is easier to learn," she said with a huff.

"Yes, because it lacks sophistication" said Raphael.

"Raphael," Ziva hissed.

She was pointedly ignored, he enjoyed riling up Francisca too much.

"Lacks silly rules," Francisca amended sharply.

"Shall we actually get started?" interrupted Amelia, then turned to Ziva and Raphael. "And no chatting in French this time!"

Ziva pouted and Raphael tutted. She barely got an opportunity to speak French these days.

"Yes, no silly French," Francisca agreed, nodding her head and wanting to get the last word in.

Eventually, they all organised themselves into the assortment of comfy chairs and the sofa surrounding the coffee table where the game was to be played.

Francisca and Raphael continued their argument as this was going on, neither wanting to give in.

"That is not how you say that!" Raphael exclaimed.

"This is why Spanish is better," Francisca argued as Ziva doled out the letter pieces.

The Mossad Officer tried to hide a smile as she gave the woman her starting letters and exchanged an amused look with Amina. This was a recurring rant of the older woman's. Especially when her English was corrected.

"I don't think any language is any _better_ than the other," Amelia said hesitantly.

She did have a point, Ziva thought, though she would argue that certain languages were more _useful_ than others depending on the situation. You weren't going to get very far in Israel if you only spoke Spanish. Not that she was going to say that to Francisca, not even a deity would have much luck in preventing her from defending her mother-tongue.

"English makes the least sense out of all out languages," Francisca argued.

"At least English doesn't have two words for you or they," Amelia said petulantly. "It's so pointless, I _hated_ Learning the spelling differences for the same damn word."

"Just because my language easily demonstrates respect-"

"It just makes it more complicated! English does perfectly well with one word for it and we have no respect issues!"

The door rapped loudly. Amelia and Francisca glared at each other, not wanting to end their argument. The knocking became more incessant. With a sigh, Francisca picked herself up and went to answer the door.

The guests could just about hear an enthusiastic exchange of greetings and then two pairs of footsteps heading their direction.

"Sorry, had a group stay until after closing. Was late cleaning up," Fakhir said by way of greeting.

Everyone made sympathetic noises. Fakhir worked as a chef in a popular restaurant which was good, he loved the fast pace, but his manager was spineless when it came to enforcing 'last food order' times.

"I thought you were bringing your American co-worker, Tom?" he asked as he pulled off his jacket, he still had his uniform on.

"Tim," Ziva corrected. "And I did but he couldn't make this one. His sister is in town."

"Ah, next one then?"

"He hopes so."

"Good, good," he said, looking around. "Have you already started?"

"Was just about to," said Amelia. "We can count the pieces out again..."

"Or he could join one of us," Liu pointed out from her squished position between Amina and Ziva on the couch.

Her elbows were pointy.

Everyone made noises of agreement and looked at him expectantly.

"I will pair with Amina, then," he decided after a nod from the woman in question.

"That might be more of a hindrance than a help," Amelia said drily.

Fakhir stuck his tongue out at her and pulled a chair across to Amina.

"You'll see," he announced. "We will win it all."


	7. Game 2: Boundless Enthusiasm

They had forgotten how enthusiastic Raphael could be about this game. He hadn't been able to make the last three games due to work commitments (a big contract for a _manifique_ customer apparently) which was _just_ long enough to forget that they really shouldn't play scrabble in a confined area when he was playing. Francisca's living room was definitely a confined area due to her large kitchen taking up much of the ground floor. She never had them play on there even though it had a big table (that wasn't even the dining table!) and lots of space. That wasn't for guests apparently. Instead, three of them (Ziva, Amina and Liu) were squished onto a couch that you sank into, the only proper armchair having been won by Amelia. Francisca herself was on another comfortable chair and Raphael had plopped himself on the floor, much to Francisca's disgust, and now Fakhir lay claim to the padded stool. It was cramped and warm but it made everything so much more fun. Have you ever had to hide your letters from someone who was pressed up against you? It made for an incredibly cutthroat game and they had some vicious players amongst them.

But back to Raphael's...enthusiasm. He was _already_ vibrating in excitement.

"We haven't even started yet," Amelia scolded him.

"It is not my fault. It is the anticipation," he told her.

"Then we better start playing,"

* * *

"This game is rigged against me," Amelia complained not long into the game. She was currently in last place points-wise.

"Yes, because we all have x-ray vision and can pick what letters we want," Liu said sarcastically.

"X-ray is when you can see through things, yes?" Francesca asked. "I think my grandson's comics have it in them."

"Common superhero power," Amelia explained. "It's how they see hidden objects on people."

That would be a very useful skill to have in Ziva's opinion, much more useful than flying. You could see what weapons a person had and where they were. Perfect for an assassin.

"I need that so I can see through the bag," Amelia grumbled, fiddling with her letters. "But knowing my luck I'd still not get decent points."

"It is about knowing what words the letters fit into as well as your letters," Amina pointed out, nodding at Fakhir to take his turn.

The man grinned and promptly picked out his letters, he'd obviously been planning this.

"Seriously?" Amelia whined.

"What can I say? I have the skills," he said proudly, laying out his letters. "I believe that is twelve points."

"That puts you in third place," Amina informed him, noting his points down on the piece of paper they were using for the purpose.

"Much better than last time," said Liu, shaking her head at the man who was currently very absorbed in his task.

Fakhir was a very _precise_ man. It's what made him a fantastic chef but when it bled into everyday life...well, that was another matter. Especially in Scrabble. He liked all the tiles to be _perfectly_ on their squares and would fix them until they were so. The rest of them had become just as pedantic to save time. Well, they couldn't be _as_ pedantic but they tried to help.

"Your turn, Raphael," said Fakhir, finally pleased with how the tiles were positioned and taking new ones from the bag.

The Frenchman jumped out of his crouched position, nearly up ending the bored as he flailed about. Thankfully he managed not too, though Liu got an elbow to the shin, and was soon peering over the board to deduce his next word.

"English is so inelegant without accents," Raphael complained.

"I'm glad, English does not need more excuses to change the pronunciation of letters," said Fakhir, frowning at his letters.

Ziva raised an eyebrow at him.

"What?"

"Does Arabic not change how a letter is looked depending on where it is in a word?"

A stuck-out tongue was what she got in response.

"How do you even remember what way round the accents go?" Liu asked, placing an 'e' and a 'd' on the board to make the word 'excited'.

"You just know it," Raphael said with a sniff, feeling like his language was under attack.

"Lots of memorisation," Ziva added. "It helps if you always see it."

"That makes more sense," Liu said with a nod. "It's how you learn the tones in Mandarin."

Amelia shook her head. "I don't have the memory for that."

"You would if your ability to live depended on it."

The good-natured bickering was interrupted by Amina swearing under her breath in Arabic as she tried to get up from the sofa, making Fakhir and Ziva snicker. She so rarely swore but apparently pregnancy brought that out in her.

"Why did I sit here again?" she complained, trying to push herself up.

"I did offer you this chair," Amelia said mildly, patting the one she was seated on.

That got her a dark glare from the Arab woman. Struggling to hide a smile, Ziva grabbed her by the arm and Liu did the same on the other side. Between the two of them they got her up. Sending a final glare to the sofa, Amina left muttering darkly.

"What was she saying?" Francisca asked, looking at Ziva and Fakhir.

"Complaints about babies kicking bladders," Fakhir answered, amused.

"But nowhere near as polite as that," Ziva added, hiding her own smile.

Raphael perked up at that and turned away from his conversation with Liu. He was always interested in learning the intricacies of other languages.

"Oh? She must teach me," he suggested enthusiastically.

Francisca gave him a sharp look and reached across to rap him on the head.

"No swearing," she scolded.

Raphael nodded obediently but shot Ziva a wink as soon as she looked away. She had to choke back a chuckle, not wanting the Mexican woman's wrath to come down upon her. She didn't take kindly to anyone encouraging Raphael in his mission to learn as many swear words as he could. Not that that stopped any of them from helping him. They just made sure that Francisca was nowhere in sight when they did.

"My turn," Ziva said hurriedly

Francisca turned her suspicious look to her.

Uh oh.


	8. Game 2: Rigged I Tell You

Amina got up yet again to go to the bathroom. She wasn't any more cheerful about it. On the plus side, she was getting better at getting off the sofa. She had been offered the chair but she had refused it out of pride.

"Is she okay?" Fakhir asked worriedly, his eyes following her as she left the room.

"She's fine," Amelia assured him.

"Just very, very pregnant," Franscisca added. "It makes you pee a lot."

"Francisca!"

"What, it is true," the older woman said defensively. "Everyone knows that."

"You don't need to announce it," Amelia scolded. "You don't talk of such things in polite conversation."

"Everybody pees, Amelia."

The American woman scowled at Liu. "You're not helping."

"That sounds like the title to a children's book my grandson has," added Francisca.

"I didn't think it was that much," Fakhir muttered, not knowing whether to be in awe or disturbed at that knowledge.

Ziva patted him sympathetically on the shoulder.

"This is what you get for being single," she teased.

He pulled a face at her and waved his hand at the board.

"Can I take my turn?" he requested, obviously wanting to move the conversation along.

"Go ahead," Amelia directed. "I have the perfect word for my turn."

[xxxxxx]

"You took my word," Amelia complained, flinging her accusation at Ziva.

Ziva raised an eyebrow. "I assure you; I stole nothing of yours."

"One of these days I'm going to get all of you to use contractions," Amelia grumbled, folding her arms in a huff. "And you put down the word I was going to put down."

"Nothing in Ziva's sentence could have used a contraction," Liu pointed out.

"Of course, I put that word down, it gave me double points," Ziva told the American.

"I meant I'm going to get you all to speak less formally," Amelia told Liu before turning back to Ziva, pointing a finger at her, "Exactly! It was going to get me out of last place! Maybe even let me win for a change!"

"I doubt that," Raphael said with a sniff. "Have you seen the gap between you and Ziva?"

"Tony is always complaining how formal my speech is," Ziva said. "That is the excuse he uses for his many odd movie choices. To learn slang and colloquialisms."

"Oh, _Tony_," Amina said, wiggling her eyebrows.

Ziva had to restrain herself from elbowing the pregnant woman.

"That's not a bad idea," Amelia said thoughtfully. "Maybe we should change this to a movie club."

"Nothing for you to lose at," Liu teased.

"I do not think that is a good idea," said Fakhir, shaking his head. "We can barely decide on what snacks to have. Do you really think we will be able to decide on a movie?"

"No one had problems with today's snacks," said Amelia, gesturing to the plates that only had crumbs on them.

They had only very briefly been piled high with treats.

"That is because Francisca made them," Fakhir retorted. "Everyone loves Francisca's food."

Or was too scared of the woman to say otherwise, Ziva added in her head.

The Mexican woman looked very pleased at that pronouncement.

* * *

"Okay, y'all have to stop stealing my words," Amelia demanded, scowling at everyone. "It's not cool anymore."

"We can't help it if it is our turns before yours," Ziva replied, picking her new letters from the bag.

"You could have chosen a different word!" Amelia continued to complain.

Ziva gave her a puzzled frown, "But I had the letters for this one."

Amelia pouted. "You could at least _try_ being nice to me. I'm obviously at a disadvantage here."

Amina snorted, "Yes, because the native English speaker has a disadvantage in an English word game."

"Exactly!"

"Why would I be nice to you?" Ziva asked her, brow furrowed. "It is a competition in which someone has to win. I do not want to lose."

"Neither do I!"

"Pray for better letters," Francisca advised, rearranging her own letters.

"Because _that's_ really going to help."

The older woman shrugged. "I have not received me in last place yet," she pointed out, patting her rosary.

[xxxxxx]

"I _told_ you this game was rigged against me."

"How does that work if we can't see what letters we are getting?" Liu asked, interested.

"Or control what you are picking," Raphael added, looking inordinately pleased with himself.

He hadn't come last for once and was quite happy with that. Ok, he hadn't _won_ (and Ziva doubted he ever would due to his short attention span) but not losing was also very good.

Amelia huffed and crossed her arms. "Cosmic Karma," she claimed. "The world's against me."

"Worlds?" asked Ziva, feeling baffled. "How many worlds are there?"

"What?"

"You said 'worlds are against you', did you not?" Ziva repeated, frowning. "How can many worlds be against you? Is this another American saying?"

Amelia gave her a blank look before her face cleared and she laughed. Ziva glared at her, this wasn't funny.

"I meant that the world _is_ against me. Not multiple worlds!"

Ah, that made a lot more sense.

"You are just annoyed that you have come in last again," Liu told her, looking particularly smug.

She had reclaimed her top spot as winner in this game. By quite a margin too. Her exams and essays were done, for the time being, so she wasn't distracted in this game.

"I've come dead last for the past four games," Amelia complained, folding her arms. "It's just not right."

"You need a better vocabulary," Ziva teased.

That got her a dark look, which was probably meant to be intimidating but Ziva had had far worse directed at her.

"What I need is to be less distracted by _certain_ people."

They all turned to look at Raphael.

"I cannot help it that I am enthusiastic about life," he complained.

"Does it need quite as much arm movements?"

"How else am I meant to show it?"

"Facial expressions. Like a _normal_ person."

Raphael pouted. "That would be no fun."

**AN: In response to some reviews; don't worry this is going to pick up soon (and hopefully make it more interesting) because I'm going to incorporate some of what happened in the episode into it. Kind of like Ziva''s reactions and how they affected her. I'm using these early chapters to set up the characters. Chapter 10 is hopefully where this is going to happen so if you want Ziva''s thoughts on certain episodes, please suggest them to me! I'm starting with 'Jeopardy' in Season 4 so they have to be after that. R****emember, reviews get sneak peaks of the next chapter! Thanks everyone for reading!**


	9. Culture

"I just don't understand why you'd get together to play _Scrabble_ of all things, " Tony said, shaking his head.

"It's better that Monopoly," McGee told him.

Tony shuddered at the thought of a lot of bewildered and frustrated immigrants playing Monopoly. According to Ziva, they had culture clashes over _Scrabble_. That game is tame, who knows what would happen if they played Monopoly. You'd probably learn a lot of new insults though.

"Good point," he admitted.

Ziva gave them both a confused look but Tony shook his head dismissively. He was not going to encourage her to play that game. She was volatile enough at the best of times. Someone was bound to get stabbed if she played.

"We are doing it to improve our English," she protested.

Tony gave her a look. "How is being with people who have English as a second or third language-" Ziva opened her mouth to correct him but he held up his hand, "-or whatever number English is for you- good for your English skills?"

Ziva's mouth opened in closed in a very fish-like manner. Tony gave her a smug look, grin and all. _Ohh_, he was _right_ and she didn't like it. She huffed at him, refusing to give him the pleasure of making her pout.

"Okay, it is more for friendships with people who have gone through similar experiences," Ziva corrected.

"A very important thing, " Ducky said, appearing from the elevator, brandishing reports. "Having people who have had similar experiences is good for your mental health."

"I thought that it was bad?" McGee asked. "You never get new viewpoints, right?"

"Only if that is all you surround yourself with," he explained. "It can become toxic and unhealthy not creating new experiences or unwilling to see past your own viewpoint."

"So, have you come across any other Mossad Officers?" Tony teased. "You know, to share experiences with?"

Ziva threw her pen at him. It would have nailed him in the forehead if his reflexes hadn't been sharpened by her. There was an upside and a downside to everything. It was still a bad joke to make though Ziva supposed that Tony didn't know that she had to be made aware of any Mossad Officers in the United States. It was part of her job description though not one she advertised. Coming across a 'surprise' Officer would not be a very good thing.

"Don't most people hang out with people like them, though?" McGee persisted. "That's how you make friends."

"Yes, we tend to seek out people who are just like us," Ducky explained, looking pleased that _someone_ was asking questions. "We think that it is the safest thing to do."

"But it's not," McGee stated.

"Well, it is a little more complicated than that, you see-"

"Got reports there, Ducky?" Tony asked, interrupting the _fascinating_ conversation.

"Ah yes," the man looked around the bull pen. "The bloodwork that Jethro requested."

"He's been hauled upstairs," Tony informed him.

Ducky winced and passed the papers to Tony. "Please inform me when he has returned."

"Will do," said McGee.

"What brought up the topic of 'sharing similar experiences' in the first place?" the Doctor asked curiously.

"Tony asked Ziva why her and her friends play Scrabble," McGee explained.

"Scrabble? Fabulous game," Ducky said cheerfully. "Though I always seem to have arguments with my American friends about spelling."

"We have that problem too," said Ziva with a smile. "We have an American, a British one and the rest of us were taught English by either a British or an American teacher."

"That must make an... interesting game, my dear."

"That is one way of putting it."

"The arguments you mention before?" McGee asked sympathetically.

Ziva nodded her response and looked at Ducky.

"You are welcome to join us for a game, Ducky," she invited, her friends always welcomed more people, immigrant or not. Though, technically Ducky _was_ an immigrant. Just not one that came to mind when you thought of the word.

"What about me?" Tony demanded in an outraged tone. "Don't I get an invitation? I _am_ your partner after all."

Ziva exchanged smiles with the other two men, the younger rolling his eyes at Tony's dramatics.

"You don't like Scrabble, Tony."

"I never said that," he protested.

"You certainly implied it, my boy."

"You don't like 'silly word games' as you call them," McGee finished up the accusations, folding his arms.

Tony's pout got bigger

"But you may have an invitation," Ziva said half-teasingly.

She wouldn't really mind if he took up the offer, tough she'd probably feel self-conscious, not really used to mixing work and social life like that.

Her partner pulled a face at her.

"I still think watching movies would be better," Tony huffed, hunch in his shoulders up.

"What a surprise," McGee said sarcastically.

"Actually, one of my friends suggested that," Ziva told them. "Though it was the American..."

"She's just looking out for you guys, trying to help your English."

"No," Ziva replied, shaking her head and trying not to laugh as she remembered. "It is because she keeps on losing at Scrabble."

Tony's face fell and then he shrugged. "I can still get behind it. We should get together and educate you all on proper American cinema."

McGee sighed nosily and rolled his eyes.

"You'd just show them spy movies and old films," he accused.

"Nothing wrong with that. Both genres perfectly showcase American film," Tony retorted then scathing added, "I suppose _you_ would show them sci-fi."

McGee glared without answering which was all the response Tony needed. The older agent grinned victoriously.

"I am pretty sure Amelia would just show us those Romantic Comedies," Ziva said, rolling her eyes in disgust.

Ziva David definitely did _not_ enjoy any sort of Romance movie. She found them boring and pointless.

"Between the three of them you should get the full American Cinematic Experience," Ducky told her with a twinkle in his eyes. She did not need him to encourage them.

Ziva sighed and shook her head as her two teammates continued to bicker about movie genres across the bull pen, all thoughts of work forgotten.


	10. Game 3: To French or Not To French

"Guten Tag, Ziva!"

Ziva was soon enveloped into a bone-crushing hug that Abby would be envious of. She swore she heard something crack.

"Oof, Guten Tag, Lukas, Ziva returned, awkwardly twisting her arm that was only half caught by his embrace to pat him on the arm. "It is good to see you."

Lukas was very stereotypically German in some aspects, from the harsh-sounding accent, to his broad chest and strong arms (to which he was putting good use to now) to his bluntness.

"Oh, hi Ziva," came a noticeably different accent.

Ziva twisted her neck to see the newcomer. She couldn't see anything past Lukas' biceps. At least she recognised the voice.

"Pamela! It is good to see you!"

"Yep," a strange English accent returned. "Finally got some time off."

Pamela was a mechanic and, despite her complaints, usually picked up as many hours as she could at the garage she worked at. She really got into her work and thought of each job as much of an art as Raphael did his designs. The woman finally came into view, a wide grin on her far as she noticed Ziva's predicament.

"You can put her down now, Lukas," she instructed, tugging at his arm. Not that that moved it even slightly.

"Oh yeah," he said sheepishly, carefully setting Ziva back on her feet. She rolled her eyes at him good-naturedly. He was like a friendly giant. "Are we playing now?"

"Yes, Amina said decisively.

"Someone catch me up," Pamela demanded as they turned towards the game area.

They were back at Amina's today; her children having been whisked over to Amelia's house for a play date by their husbands.

"You missed Raphael's grumbling about accents again last week," Amelia told her as they settled themselves into the Arab woman's living room this time.

"Accents? Those little lines they use in French? I _hate_ them. Stupid, pointless buggers," Pamela said quite forcibly.

"I would expect nothing else from English swine," Raphael said with an affected sniff.

Pamela rolled her eyes.

"I thought you said he was grumbling about them?" she asked, confused.

"He was grumbling about English's _lack_ of them." Ziva offered.

"Why on earth would you _want_ to have them?" Pamela demanded, spinning round to poke the Frenchman. "They make everything more complicated!"

"I refuse to argue with such, such ignorance."

"They're stupid buggers," the English woman continued. "I was always losing half-marks for them at school because I either forgot them or had them the wrong way around."

"You should have lost a full mark," he sniffed pompously. "For your ignorance."

"Then I would have failed GSCE French and, according to my teacher, unable to go to uni," Pamela retorted. "I am grateful for the half marks. Still pointless though."

"You should not fault a language for your poor memory."

"_My_ memory only has room for useful things. I get rid of the rest. Like Sherlock."

"I do not think you should emulate a psychopath," Ziva teased, knowing it would set the British woman off.

"He's a high functioning _sociopath_," she defended, glaring at her like she had committed some sort of crime.

Ziva raised her hands up in defence, "Of course."

"Either way," Raphael interrupted. "Your definition of 'useful' is obviously incorrect.

Pamela threw a cushion at him.

"Watch the vase!" Amina shrieked, bustling over as fast as a heavily pregnant woman could to hug said object close to her and glare at her two friends.

"It didn't go anywhere near it!" Pamela protested.

"It _could_ have," Amina responded sulkily, looking between the two culprits suspiciously before pointedly placing it on a shelf far away from them.

"I have good aim, especially when it involves a target as big as Raph's head," Pamela argued.

"I dislike this nickname, my name is _Raphael_," the French man grumbled. "It is not difficult. Even for you English speakers."

Unsurprisingly, Pamela ignored him. She did that a lot.

"It is very biblical," Ziva told him with assurance at his pout.

He perked up at that description. "Yes, you see? Very important. Not something you shorten."

"Isn't it one of the names of the angels or something?" Amina asked, frowning in thought.

"One of the archangels," Ziva supplied, remembering her Torah lessons.

"Also, a ninja turtle," Amelia added.

Everyone gave her an odd look.

"My kids love them, OK?"

"See? Very important," Raphael said pretentiously, folding his arms and put his nose up in the air.

"I think we need a pin to deflate Raph's head," Pamela teased, patting said appendage fondly.

Raphael brushed her hand away and pulled a face at her. She responded in a kind. Amelia gasped and smacked her around the back of the head. Ziva winced in sympathy, that sounded an awful lot harder than Gibbs'.

"Don't do that!" Amelia scolded. "It's rude."

"That's kind of the point," Pamela told her, rubbing the back of her head.

"Well don't."

"Prude."

"I have children. I don't want them to pick up rude gestures," she said primly.

"Especially since they already know the rude words," Amina teased.

"That was not my fault. It was John's." John was her husband.

"You said it!" Amina retorted.

"He made me!"

"Can we please start playing?" Lukas pleaded, gesturing at the board.

Everyone's pieces had already been doled out and the board was empty, just waiting for the first word.

"Yeah, get a move on _Raphael_," Amelia prodded, pointedly putting emphasis on his name.

He sniffed at her and frowned at his letters.

"Do not _rush_ me."

They all groaned.

"Brilliance take time."

Amelia poked him again. Glaring at her, Raphael placed the letter 'e' down, still grumbling about English's lack of elegance.

Ziva just shook her head, he complained about this every single game they played. It was still amusing, mostly due to the dark look he always shot the letter 'e', but it did get old. He never used any new material in his grumblings, he really would have to get more creative.

Oh, he had started with 'ease'. Ziva shifted herself into a more comfortable position as she thought what words she could play off it.


	11. Game 3: Embassy Woes

**AN: Game 3 is set soon after Season 3 Episode 22: Jeopardy.**

Ziva sighed as she rubbed at her eyes. She wasn't focused on this game at all and it was reflected in her points. She just mistook a 'g' for a 'j' if that showed were her mind was not.

"Ok, that's the third sigh in as many minutes," Amelia said, looking up from her tiles with an expectant look. "And it can't be because you can't find a word."

Ziva scrunched up her nose at the American woman, not sure whether she wanted to not volunteer anything, blame the game or actually say what happened over the past few days.

"It's been a long couple of days," she decided to say, thinking that it was the best way to put it without having to explain.

That was definitely an understatement. From people dying in her custody to the dead person's brother trying to take his revenge on the Director, the past few days had definitely _not_ been good. It definitely hadn't reflected well on her as a liaison at all.

"I thought that that was pretty much your job description," said Pamela, picking up one of her tiles and then shaking her head, she was still trying to decide on a word. Francisca sighed impatiently; she obviously had a word ready to go.

Ziva rolled her eyes but didn't deny it. The hours she put in at NCIS for some cases rivalled some of the Ops she did for Mossad. She blamed Gibbs' 'work ethic', not that she could really complain. Hers was somewhat similar but usually did not involve a whole team of people.

"I detect that these days have been longer than usual," Raphael guessed, eyeing both Amelia and Francisca

"I did not know that you were in the detective work," Amina commented.

"I'm not," said the French man.

She gave him a puzzled frown. "But you detected something."

"Yes."

The confusion did not clear from her face.

"I think he meant that he noticed something," Amelia explained, trying to rescue her friend.

"Why did he not say that?"

"I _did_," Raphael pointed out.

"You did not. You were doing detective work," she insisted.

"Detect doesn't mean doing detective work."

"It comes from the word detective, of course it does!"

"It _means_-"

Pamela pointedly coughed, interrupting their linguistic argument before it got any more heated and nonsensical. Or before she got dragged into it. Ziva knew that the English woman did not appreciate being forced to explain the subtleties of the English language. She and Amelia always managed to find some way to disagree.

"This is why German is more useful," Lukas informed them all before Pamela could direct them away from this conversation. "Our words mean what they say. No fuss about them."

"No finesse, you mean," Raphael said with a sniff.

Pamela gave him a warning look. They did not need a 'What language is superior' argument. Again.

"Finesse is not useful when you confuse people what you mean," Lukas argued.

Pamela coughed pointedly again and this time got everyone's attention.

"Why don't we _ask_ Ziva why she is so tired?" she suggested.

Everyone looked at her blankly as if such a simple thing had never been an option. They all turned to look at Ziva who raised an eyebrow in response.

"Well?" Amelia asked impatiently.

"I need to attend a meeting at my Embassy," she told them with an annoyed look.

Everyone who wasn't a naturalised citizen winced in sympathy. Even if it was in your favour, which this was probably not going to be, those types of meetings were never fun. Always involved some sort of red tape and far too much time being spent there. Ziva was definitely not looking forward to that but there were far more pressing matters other than wasted time and tense political niceties when going to the Israeli Embassy for her. Or rather _one_ pressing matter. Her father. The man who was the Ambassador would have immediately contacted on something regarding her whether she was in her father's employ or not. It was just rather unfortunate that she was. Not that that would have made a jot of difference to Eli David and his control over his children. A pang went through her heart. Over his only living child, she meant.

"Well, I assume that you have not committed some sort of crime or killed anyone or you would already be residing in your Embassy," Amelia said, resting her chin on steepled fingers.

Ziva flinched imperceptibly at that.

They did _not_ need to know about the aforementioned dead suspect.

"No, no, no," Amina disagreed. "It would only be if you were caught by American police about the death of a person would you be in your Embassy. If you haven't you would just have to contact them for advice on how to deal with the situation."

Several stares and unhinged jaws were directed at the woman. She sniffed and flicked the end of her hijab over her shoulder.

"What?"

"How do you even _know_ that?" Amelia demanded.

"And is true?" Lukas asked curiously.

Francisca messed about with the order of her tiles and answered without looking up, "My Embassy told me of something similar about seven years ago when I had to sort something out there."

"Again, _why_?" Amelia spluttered, turning to the older woman.

Ziva just leaned back and shook her head. She exchanged a grin with Raphael, not minding at all that the conversation had been derailed.

Francisca shrugged. "To be prepared."

"I'm pretty sure that's not how Embassies are supposed to work."

"Does the American Embassy not do this?"

"I don't know!"

"Anyway, I am sure Ziva has not killed anyone," Raphael piped up. "She would not be sitting here."

"She works for a federal agency. They sometimes have to shoot people," Amelia pointed out.

"Murdered in cold blood then," he amended, frowning at her.

Ziva just about stifled a cough at that. If only they knew.

"It could be for paperwork," Lukas logically suggested. "Some you have to do at the Embassy."

"Or it could be Amina's second option," Francisca pointed out. "She may not have been detected."

Everyone groaned at the use of the earlier problem word.

"Again, why don't we just _ask_ her?" Pamela asked in exasperation.

For a second time, or was it a third, the six people turned to stare expectantly at her, their scrabble game all but forgotten. Not that they had got far into the game. They only been around everyone once with only Ziva and Raphael having gone twice - Amelia still not having decided on a word.

"An _incident_ came up at work," she answered diplomatically.

Which of course did not exactly help matters and raised more questions than answers if the number of eyebrows that just soared upwards was anything to go by.


	12. Game 3: Poison

"How do you have an 'incident' in a federal building?" Amelia asked, breaking the silence.

See, this is why she was glad for these people. They weren't aware what a 'Mossad Liaison Officer' meant, or rather - they weren't aware what her role in Mossad was. Well, Fakhir had given her the side-eye when she had first said what her role at NCIS was but hadn't said anything to her about it. But anyway, they didn't assume that the incident had anything to do with her or that it had anything to do with violence like _some_ of her colleagues thought. Admittedly, she hadn't told them what the incident _was_ so their opinions could change quite rapidly.

Ziva eyed her friends, mentally weighing up her options. Did she tell them what happened? Was she _allowed_ to tell them what happened? No had told her she couldn't, there was no legal case brought against her. The appointment with her Embassy was just a formality, she hoped anyway.

"We're not going to continue the game until I explain, are we?"

"Nope," Amelia replied cheerfully, folding her hands on the table.

"Preferably before this baby makes an appearance," Amina added, rubbing her stomach and wincing. The baby must have given her a vicious kick there.

She looked back and forth between everyone, still thinking about it. It wasn't exactly polite conversation, was it? But they all looked so eager to hear her story. They probably thought it was going to be like one of those spy movies Tony inexplicably liked (Why watch then when it is basically your job?).

"A suspect, uh, died today," she said hesitantly, realising just how bad it sounded when she said it out loud.

But she immediately got sympathetic looks.

"Oh no."

"Did it put a stop to your investigation?"

"Did he try to kill you?"

They all turned around to look questioningly at Raphael. He seemed to be unconcerned about what he just said. In fact, he sounded almost _eager_.

"Really, Raphael?" Amelia asked in exasperation.

"It is a valid question," he said defensively.

"You don't just ask people that!"

"And why not?"

"She could be traumatised!"

Ziva managed to stop herself from snorting at that. Her? Traumatised by someone trying to kill her? Yeah, right. That was basically her life. Fakhir eyed her somewhat suspiciously and she straightened herself up. She looked back at the table; Lukas, Pamela and Amina were watching their other two friend's argument much like you would watch a tennis match. She rolled her eyes and coughed to get their attention. It was almost alarming how fast everyone's faces snapped around to meet hers. Her lips suddenly felt a bit dry and she licked at them

"He was in my custody," she finally said causing all of the foreign nationals to flinch. "Um...in an elevator."

Silence reigned after her statement, apparently no one knew quite what to say.

"Did he get poisoned or something?"

Well, Raphael apparently did. Amelia smacked him on the arm.

"Owww!" He yelped, clutching at his arm dramatically. "What was that for?"

"You were being insensitive," Pamela took over the scolding and added a finger shake for good measure.

"It was an honest question!"

"One I would like the answer to," said Fakhir, giving Ziva a sly nudge.

She frowned at him, not knowing if he was teasing or not. Everyone else was giving him incredulous looks.

"Really?" Amelia demanded.

He shrugged. "Suspects get poisoned all the time. Stops them from spilling secrets."

"See!" Raphael practically shouted. "Fakhir agrees with me! I am not being dramatic."

"Yes, you are," Amelia informed him and then turned to Fakhir. "Where the hell do suspects get poisoned outside of movies?"

Fakhir and Ziva exchanged a brief knowing look before he shook his head.

"It does not matter."

"See? It _happens_," Raphael stressed.

Ziva decided to stop this line of thinking in its tracks. "He was not poisoned. He had a medical issue."

"But this happened when he was with you?" Amina asked shrewdly.

"What's the matter with that?" Amelia asked, looking at them inquiringly. "It's not like she touched him or anything."

Ziva breathed out through her nose heavily.

"That was not so simple to prove, " she admitted, still feeling guilty over the whole debacle she had caused.

"She said she was alone in an elevator with him," Lukas pointed out.

"She never said alone," Pamela corrected and arched an eyebrow at Ziva. "Were you?"

"Yes..."

Again, all of the foreign nationals flinched. Pamela looked around them in confusion.

"What's the matter with that? An investigation should clear that up."

"People are naturally biased toward foreigners," Fakhir said gently, knowing that Amelia still had a naive view of the world.

"But her team trust her!"

And thank God for that or else Ziva didn't know what would have happened to her. It had already not been pleasant, especially since Gibbs had been fairly suspicious. That had hurt more than the brief investigation.

"And any investigation has to be cleared through the Embassy," Raphael added knowingly.

Now everyone's questioning looks were directed at him.

"I had an issue with some fabric I imported," he shrugged off.

"At least your country has a good relationship with America," muttered Amina darkly.

"So, did it cause a problem between Israel and the US?" Lukas asked curiously.

Ziva shook her head. "I am not that important to relations between our two countries."

Well, she really hoped not. Her name _had_ been cleared, this Embassy appointment was for, well, she didn't exactly know what it was for.

"So, everything's good?" Amelia checked.

"I have not been deported," Ziva tried to joke but it fell a little flat.

"Shall we get back to the game?" Lukas asked eagerly, having had enough of the dead person talk.

"Whose turn was it?" asked Pamela, twisting herself around so she was facing the table again.

"Mine," Amelia replied, raising her hand. "I couldn't decide on a word.

They all groaned in remembrance.

"I'm not as bad as Lukas!" she protested.

"Hey-"

"Oh!" she held a hand up to interrupt him. "I have a word!"

"Thank the Lord for that," Pamela muttered.

They all watched as she put her tiles on the board and looked up proudly. Ziva pinched the bridge of her nose.

"It's 'dead'!"


	13. New Player

"You should definitely come to the next game," Ziva tried to persuade her word-inclined friend yet again as Gibbs disappeared up to the Director's office. "You really would enjoy it."

McGee gave her an unsure look.

"You would!" she insisted.

Ziva definitely thought that it would be more interesting with McGee playing with them. He had an extremely broad vocabulary and an eye for seeing things that other people didn't. It's what made him a good investigator after all and would certainly make him a worthy adversary in scrabble. She thought she had persuaded him the last time but apparently not, which is why she extended the invitation again. Though, to be fair she hadn't directly invited him to the last game and he was not the type of person to ask or try and insert himself into it (like a certain partner she could mention). So, she was fixing that now.

"McGee's just scared that he'll lose," Tony told her, giving the man in question a taunting look.

"Am not!" McGee retorted heatedly.

"Of course, you are. Why else won't you play? Scared that people who have a more limited grasp on the English language-" he gave Ziva an apologetic look and a, "- no offense-" which she waved off, it was true after all - if you discounted Pamela - and it wasn't a malicious statement, "- are going to soundly beat you."

It did give her a good opening to jump in. "I did not know you were so prideful, McGee."

"I'm not!" He protested, looking horrified at the thought.

"Then you'll have no problem playing then," Tony said, his voice never going above a normal speaking tone.

"You know what then, I'll play!" McGee announced, standing up.

Tony eyed him up and down and scoffed. "I don't think so."

"I will!"

"Uh huh."

McGee whirled around to face her and instructed, "Tell your friends that there'll be another player for the next game."

"I will," Ziva easily agreed, happy that he finally was going to.

She really wanted to see Liu lose for once.

McGee shot Tony a triumphant look before striding confidently out of the bull pen.

"I bet he's away to get a victory Nutter Butter," Tony said with a smirk.

"Thank you, Tony," Ziva muttered to her partner under her breath, realising what he had done.

He winked at her. "No problem."

Ziva leaned back in her chair a nodded in satisfaction, a smile stretching across her face. The next game should be pretty interesting.

"You can come too," she offered, feeling a bit bad for leaving him out.

Tony looked at her contemplative before shaking his head and giving her an easy smile. "Nah, I'll just wait for that American Movie Group. Much more up my street."

"You could be a founding member," Ziva said drily.

His eyes positively lit up at that thought. "Yeah, I could!" he said excitedly sitting up straight. "I already have all of the required movies," he bragged.

Ziva raised an eyebrow in disbelief. She was aware of Tony's movie collection, their movie nights had proved the span of it, but she had never _seen_ it. Surely, he was simply exaggerating...

"Really?" she asked him, resting her hands under her him.

"Yep," he nodded. "All of the good classics. There's -"

"- a dead marine down by the Potomac," Gibbs interrupted, striding to his desk to grab his badge and gun. "Gear up!"

The two of them scrambled to do the same and follow him to the elevator. Ziva managed to snatch the keys to the van as McGee helpfully provided a distraction by running past to belatedly mirror them, crumbs down his front.

* * *

A shadow fell across her desk, it was McGee. Ziva gave him a curious look. It looked like he had calmed himself down from earlier. A case would do that to a person.

"Hey," he said sheepishly.

"Hello McGee, are you okay?" she asked, knowing it was custom to check that.

Why? She did not know. Ziva was pretty sure that in most cases people would prefer _not_ to hear another person's problems. A strange American custom was what she had put it down to. Give her bluntness or general apathy any day. People never answered the question honestly anyway.

On that note, McGee blushed at the question and scratched the back of his head. "Oh, yeah, I'm good. Thanks."

It appeared that McGee was actually being truthful, he was not exactly the type of person who could hide his emotions well. The two of them stared at each other in silence for a few moments.

"Did you want something?" Ziva eventually asked, sensing that he wasn't going to speak up.

"Yes!" he said quickly, eyes widening and voice getting a bit too loud. "Sorry, I uh, just wanted to apologise for earlier. About getting all worked up. I-"

Ziva held a hand up to stop his rambling, or else he was never going to stop. "It is okay, McGee-"

"But it's not," he argued. "It shouldn't have snapped.

She raised an eyebrow to make him fall silent. Which he did so quite quickly.

"Tony was teasing you. Ah, twisting you up?" she gave him a hesitant look.

"Winding me up, " McGee corrected, smiling. "And yes. He was."

"So, it is understandable that you snapped," she finished and then added, "he wanted you to snap."

"Yeah, he did," McGee admitted.

Ziva shrugged off his concerns and assured him, "Neither of us hold it against you. I am actually impressed you lasted so long. I would have stabbed him in a shorter amount of time."

McGee chuckled uneasily, obviously not sure if she was serious or not. She wasn't. Well, not completely, but it got a smile on his face.

"Yeah. That's not a good idea."

"Unfortunately, not," Ziva agreed and then brought the conversation back on track, "So, the next game? I will tell you this time."

McGee nodded, smiling as he returned to his desk. "Next game."

Unfortunately, neither of them made it to the next game. Or the one after that. Trying to work while your boss almost blew up, survived but only to slip into a coma tended to make all other commitments slip into the background. And what to catch the son of a bitch who dared do it.


	14. Game 4: The Takeover

**AN: This deals with the aftermath of Season 3 Episodes 23 and 24 "Hiatus"**

Ziva had now missed three Scrabble nights and tonight would make it a fourth. She had texted Amina to inform her of this, citing needing an evening of doing nothing. Nothing. Ziva snorted and shook her head at the thought. She didn't know what that felt like any more. It had definitely been a stressful few weeks.

Gibbs falling into a coma was one of the top reasons for this, of course. It was very... disconcerting she thought the word was. Not right. Yes. It wasn't right for Gibbs to fall into a coma. It just did not seem possible that Gibbs could be brought down like that. He was infallible in her eyes. Which was stupid, of course she knew that. He was human after all and their jobs came with a lot of risks. Still. It was Gibbs. He just did not _get_ injured. It was below him. And from the looks and conversations with the rest of the team, they thought so too.

However, this did not matter so much anymore as he appeared to have lost his memory when he had woken up which she had fixed. By _head_ _slapping_ him of all things. She wondered if getting him to head slap Tony would have had the same effect. She shook her head. No matter. He remembered, which she was thankful for despite all the disgruntled looks she had received from the rest of the team for being the one to do so. She was sure they would have thought of her method eventually. They were just a little more emotionally involved than she was. Emotions were of no use in a time like this. Ziva pointedly ignore her personal little breakdown with Gibbs in the hospital. He had been the only witness and she knew that he would never bring it up again. He understood how she worked.

All was still not completely well as Gibbs was now in Mexico because he felt the need to retire because of people not listening to him. He no longer thought that the job was worth doing if he couldn't do it right. Which, she could see why but she didn't think very highly of his decision. It looked and felt too much like giving up to her. Not that it mattered because he wasn't _here._

Then of course there was Tony. Her partner. As second in command, of course he had taken over as temporary lead of the team. That is how the chain of command worked. He was good at it, don't get Ziva wrong. He wouldn't have been second in command if he wasn't but he wasn't _right_. She was sure that there would come a day where it was right for Tony to take over the team but this just wasn't it. Not with Gibbs being the way he was or with Tony feeling anxious that something was going to happen to their boss. Her partner never mentioned such a thing but she could read him. Then of course there has been the whole business with the tracking down of PinPin Pula being thrust on him as well. It wasn't fair to make him team lead in such a situation or expect him to function at his best. Which he had anyway because he was Tony and that is what he did when he had to. She just wished that he hadn't had to.

Ziva sighed heavily and rubbed at her eyes. Even thinking about everything made her feel exhausted and irritable.

'Knock, knock'

She groaned. That was her door. Who on earth was at her door? Maybe they would go away.

'Knock, knock.'

Or not. That set of knocks were louder. Puzzled, Ziva picked herself up from her couch and made her way to the door. Who could that be? It was not Tony's or McGee's or even Abbey's knock. Or her neighbours. And she hadn't ordered anything. Instinctively, her fingers curled around the knife she stored at her hip as she twisted the handle-

And she blinked as she was met with a sea of faces.

"Hello," Francisca said cheerfully, evidently leading the pack.

Well, not really a pack. There were four of them. Amelia, Fakhir, Raphael and Francisca.

"What are you all-"

"It's your turn to host," Amelia cheerfully informed her.

Ziva was sure her confusion was evident on her face. She just did not have the energy to mask it.

"I told you that I was not playing this week," Ziva said, patting her pockets from her phone. She tapped through her messages and showed the screen to her friend. "See? I texted you this morning."

"Well, we've all decided that you are," Raphael said matter-of-factly.

"Without consulting me on this matter?"

"Yes." Amelia answered, peering over her shoulder. "Aren't you going to let us in?"

"It is only good manners," Raphael told her.

That got the pair a raised eyebrow. "Are you going to leave if I do not?"

"No," Francisca replied bluntly. "We will stay and make a fuss and bang doors until we get our way.

"_Francisca_," Amelia hissed.

"What?" Francisca queried with a shrug. "That was our plan, was it not."

"Well," Amelia shot Ziva a guilty look. "Yes. But you didn't need to announce it."

"She would not be able to stop us either way," was Francisca's logic.

"So," Raphael said brightly, waving the game box over his head and accidentally hitting Fakhir on the head with it. "Are we coming in?"

Rubbing a fist across her forehead in thought before she decided to step aside (pick your battles and all that, obviously this was a battle she was going to lose), Ziva felt the need to ask, "Why are you even doing this?"

"We did not want you to be sulking," Fakhir told her as he passed by.

"Brooding," Amelia hastily corrected at the dangerous look that flashed across Ziva's face. "We didn't want you to spend the night brooding over whatever you've been brooding over."

Slightly stumped at that sentence, Ziva didn't say anything but allowed them all to come into her apartment and set up the game. She eyed the cluster of people taking the pieces out of the box and already bickering good-naturedly over her kitchen table. It looked like she didn't have much of a choice anyway. Though, what they were going to do once they realised that she had no snacks she didn't know.


	15. Game 4: A Brooding Disruption

"I was not brooding," Ziva announced, pulling out a chair to take her place at her table.

The glasses of drinks she had brought over clinked as they were placed on the game board - the only available space. Frowning, Fakhir handed them out to who they belonged.

Amelia shot her a disbelieving look. "Sure, you aren't."

"I'm not!"

"What do you call 'sitting in your apartment by yourself going over every little thing that has happened' then?" Fakhir asked with a raised eyebrow.

Her mouth opened and closed, unable to formulate a response.

"Brooding," Francisca answered far too cheerfully, giving the bag of pieces a shake. "Take yours," she instructed.

Absent-mindedly, Ziva took the required number of pieces and automatically put them on the little plastic rack, not even noting what letters she received. Everyone did the same, Fakhir being the only one to seemingly organise his tiles in a logical order. He was frowning, he mustn't have received good letters.

"I wasn't-" Ziva tried to argue but was immediately cut off by Amelia.

"You were."

Huffing, Ziva flung herself back in her chair and restrained herself from crossing her arms in a pout. That would just prove their point. They were _wrong_, she didn't _brood_. Brooding meant that you were doing nothing and she was a woman of _action_, thank you very much.

"Now I see the brooding," Francisca said with a nod.

Fakhir looked up from frowning at his times to chuckle.

"That," he pointed a thumb at Ziva. "is not Ziva brooding."

At least _someone_ understood her and was on her side. See? They really were all being quite ridiculous. Fakhir was now the only one in her good books.

"That is Ziva annoyed, um-?"

"Pissed off," Amelia supplied helpfully.

Fakhir nodded. "Exactly. That is her pissed off. Because we interrupted her brooding."

And now Fakhir was back in her bed books alongside the rest of them. Possibly higher up because he betrayed her. She crossed her arms and glared at him to show her irritation. He didn't even _flinch_, she really was off her game tonight (she at least understood _that_ idiom). Hopefully, it wouldn't carry over to this game. It would be completely _shameful_ to lose after this little takeover of her home. It _definitely_ couldn't happen on her home pitch. Even with the current mood she was in.

Ziva sighed heavily. Okay, maybe she _had_ been brooding - but just a bit! There was nothing wrong with that. Everyone had the right to brood once in a while. Especially in the 'Land of the Free' as Tony was so fond of saying. Especially with what all had been happening. It wasn't like she had exactly had time to process what had happened to Gibbs and subsequently her team. None of them were working at one hundred percent at the moment, they were still off balance. She was sure that the NCIS appointed shrink would have something to say about their coping mechanisms (or _lack_ of them) but that did not matter as long as there were cases to distract them. Which Pula sort of did. She sighed again.

"Well, say I was - which I wasn't," she finally said, though that got her more scoffing, "how did you know?"

Suddenly, no one was looking at her. An eyebrow shot upwards. Nervous glances were shot at Raphael.

"_Raphael_," she said warningly.

"You sounded so down on the phone earlier!" he said defensively. "I just wanted to make sure that you were okay!"

Ziva raised an eyebrow, "And that required a whole group of people?" she asked, gesturing to everyone with a sweep of her hand.

His eyes darted around everyone at the table, where they were all studiously not meeting his eyes. Ziva would laugh if she did not want answers. None of them would every last long in an interrogation.

"Um, yes?" he replied in a questioning tone.

Ziva's eyes narrowed.

"I think that was the wrong answer, Raphael," Francisca said cheerfully as she rearranged her letters.

Both she and Raphael gave the older woman a disgruntled look, which (of course), she took no heed of.

"Can we begin?" she asked, looking around expectantly.

"Not until I get some answers," Ziva said firmly.

None of them spoke. All of them tried to avoid her gaze. Finally, Amelia sighed in exasperation.

"Look, _he_-" she pointed at Fakhir, "-was with _him_-" she waved her hand at Raphael, "-when you phoned to say that you weren't coming tonight."

"Then how did the rest of you get involved?" Ziva demanded, still feeling annoyed.

It was not necessary for them all to come around and check on her. She did not need to be checked up on! The only people who had the right to do that were Gibbs and Tony. And McGee, she supposed.

"Raphael phoned me in a panic on his to deal with 'female emotions'," Amelia explained with an eye roll.

"That's not right!" Raphael disagreed. "I asked how to deal with _Ziva's_ emotions. Or lack of them."

"I do not think that is helping your case," Francisca idly pointed out, propping herself up with her elbow on the table.

"How is that any different?" Amelia demanded.

"Ziva is scarier," Raphael said after a moment's pause.

Ziva snorted at that. At least he had got one thing right.

Amelia rolled her eyes again before turning to Ziva, "So, that's how we all got involved."

Not everyone. Ziva looked pointedly at Francisca.

"I was already at Amelia's and did not want to be left out," the older woman volunteered.

Now it was Ziva's turn to roll her eyes. That was so _Francisca_ and she couldn't even be annoyed about it.

"You don't need to talk about what happened," Amelia told her gently.

"Though it would help," Francisca informed her.

Amelia gave the woman a firm look. Francisca shrugged.

"It would," Francisca said matter-of-factly.

"You didn't need to _say_ it."

"I did. Because you didn't."

Amelia let a growl of frustration leave her. Something that Ziva did let herself chuckle at.

"What was that about be not talking about things?" Ziva prodded the American woman.

Amelia blinked in confusion at her and then her face cleared.

"Oh, yeah," she shook her head and shot Francisca a disapproving look. "You don't need to tell us anything. We can just play."

Ziva gave her a long look and, seeing nothing but honesty in her face, nodded slowly.

"Just play," she repeated with a soft smile.

Unfortunately, the moment was somewhat ruined by another of Francisca's interruptions.

"Of course, we would be quite _happy_ to know what happened..."

Amelia flicked a tile at her, which missed and skidded to the floor. Francisca scolded her rapidly in Spanish, making Ziva chuckle as everyone else looked blankly at them.

"Just play," Amelia said firmly.


	16. Game 4: Not Trying

Once Amelia retrieved her tile from beside Ziva's fridge (thankfully it did not go _under_ it as Ziva doubted that whatever else was under there was not fit for her guests' eyes) they could start playing. Finally. Even though she did not want to. It would be rude to not to and she really doubted that she could get rid of then easily. Maybe it would be one of their quick games.

"Where are the snacks?" Fakhir asked, making everyone look at her expectantly.

"Hostage takers don't get snacks," she responded snidely.

"We are not holding you hostage," Fakhir dismissed.

"You are! In my own home."

"You let us in," Amelia reminded her.

"You _forced_ yourselves in."

"Meh, same thing. We're here now."

Ziva rolled her eyes at the woman. It was obvious that nothing Ziva was going to say (the semi-polite things anyway) were going to faze her.

"Is that a 'no' on the snacks then?" Fakhir checked.

"Yes."

Francisca perked up. "You do have snacks?"

"No."

"What sort of host doesn't have snacks?" the older woman asked in an offended tone.

"The host not expecting to be one and who also hasn't had time to go to the grocery store," Ziva retorted.

"Why don't we just start playing?" Raphael said quickly, never one for this type of conflict.

Bickering, he could take (he was the cause of most of it) but not real arguments. Not that Ziva was going to argue. If there was going to be an argument it was going to be Francisca's fault.

"Who first?" asked Fakhir.

"What about Ziva?" Raphael suggested, hoping to curry some favour.

It didn't work but Ziva didn't disagree. She quickly glanced at her letters and out down the first word she saw. Everyone groaned.

"Really? 'And'? What are we supposed to build off that?" Raphael complained.

* * *

They went around the table a few times, the board between them slowly filling up with words. Ziva wasn't really paying attention to what letters she had and twice she missed high scoring words because of that. It didn't annoy her as much as it should.

"So, you are not going to be talking about it?" Francisca checked as she took the two letter she needed from the bag.

"Francisca!" everyone chorused at her in exasperation.

"What?" She looked at them. "I was just checking."

"Ziva said that she did not want to talk about it," Fakhir replied, nudging some of the tiles on the board so they were exactly within their squares.

"Don't you dare swap out vowels again," Amelia warned.

The Iraqi adopted an insulted look, "I would _never_-"

"You've done it before."

"That wasn't me! I _told_ you I had been framed!"

"It didn't really work anyway, changing the vowels just misspelled the word, it didn't make a different word."

"So, Ziva is not going to talk about whatever is bothering her?" Francisca repeated, bringing their conversation back to the original topic.

"No!" Everyone practically shouted, Ziva included this time.

Did she need to talk about how her boss, her mentor, nearly got blown up, killed? Probably. Did she need to talk about the whole losing of his memory and reliving his family's deaths? Most likely. Did she need to talk about what happened when she was the one to bring his memory back? Definitely. Did she _want_ to do any of that? Of course not. Ziva David did not do feelings, remember? Never mind those weak tears that happened when she was trying to get their Gibbs back.

"I was only asking," Francisca said peevishly.

"Well, you got an answer," Ziva replied shortly, instantly regretting her tone.

"Many times," Raphael added unhelpfully.

Francisca frowned and crossed her arms, knocking her tiles over. She quickly picked them up, her fingers still deft enough to manage that without anyone seeing them (well, Ziva did but she was trained in these things).

"How was I meant to know that was what you meant?" she complained as she placed her tiles back on her stand.

"I'm pretty sure 'no' means the same thing in most languages," Amelia told her, then glanced at Ziva to make sure.

Ziva shrugged and then nodded. Yep, in all the languages and cultures she knew a negative answer meant no.

"But you Americans say no when you really mean yes."

"No, we don't," Amelia retorted and then paused and acquiesced, "Okay, _sometimes_ we do but it's normally obvious from the tone of voice."

"Well, Ziva could have been doing that."

"Ziva is a straight talker. She would talk if she wanted to talk."

Ziva gave Amelia a grateful look, at least _somebody_ was her side even if she was going against her current wishes. How hard was it to understand that she did not want to talk? Did you even talk about this sort of thing with your not-close friends?

"We are just here to stop her brooding," Amelia continued.

"I'm not brooding!" Ziva complained, _again_.

They had gone over this as well!

"There are so many nuances to the English language," Fakhir confided with Ziva in fascination.

"There is no _nuance_ about this!" Amelia said in exasperation, throwing her hands into the air. "No means no."

Fakhir didn't look too convinced.

"Oh, just take your turn," Amelia grumbled, dumping the bag of letters by him.

* * *

"I win!" Raphael said cheerfully and then clicked at Ziva disapprovingly, "You were not even trying, Ziva."

"You won, surely it does not matter," she replied dismissively, rising to collect everyone's glasses - not wanting anyone to hang back any longer than necessary.

Yes, she aware that it was bad manners (she could almost hear her Aunt Nettie scold her) but she did not care. She wanted to get back to being alone with her thoughts (_it wasn't brooding_!).

"It doesn't make it a true win," he protested.

Ziva rolled her eyes, not really caring. Her heart wasn't exactly in this game. _And_ she was technically playing under protest. Not exactly conducive to optimal game playing.

"Oh, now you choose to be all noble," Amelia complained.

Raphael gave her an insulted look and, throwing his scarf dramatically over one shoulder, he retorted, "I am always noble."

One of Amelia's eyebrows went up. "Uh huh," she replied in a disbelieving tone.

"I am!"

"Well, where was that nobility when I genuinely forgot to stick an 'ing' on the end of my word!"

"That was just you being slow."


	17. Being There

Amelia, in a rare moment of free time in the early afternoon (thank the Lord for cousin playdates), was browsing the web. Specifically, she was catching up on the news. Well, she had been and was now fully up to date but she was now bored so she was scrolling endlessly down on the news site. Some really weird crap got reported she found. Was it really necessary to report on what colours some houses, on a street she was never going to live on, was painted? Or that someone bought Walmart's whole cheese display? Could someone even _eat_ that much cheese?

Not knowing to be exasperated or disgusted with people, her cursor was hovering over the red 'x' in the top corner when an article caught her eye. Or, to be more precise, a word in a headline caught her eye.

'NCIS Agent caught in explosion. In hospital'

"What on earth?" She muttered to herself, clicking on the article.

Once the webpage finally loaded (damn her internet connection - they really needed to phone up about that), Amelia couldn't help but let a gasp of horror escape.

The image at the top of the article was particularly...graphic. A lot of blood, a lot of debris and _scorch_ marks. Amelia didn't know that scorch marks could be that _long_. What on earth had happened? She checked the date of the article, it had been published about the time of their last scrabble game which meant the explosion happened, well, before she supposed.

Had Ziva been involved in this investigation? Her team did this sort of thing at NCIS, right? Amelia's heart jumped as her hand went to her mouth with a gasp. Did someone Ziva know _die_?

She shook her head. Okay, that was a bit of a dramatic reaction. And surely her questions would be answered by the article? So, she continued to read and very soon stopped again at a name. A very familiar looking name.

Still reading the article, she sent a quick text off to Ziva.

Your boss is called Gibbs, right?

She was pretty sure that it was, it was a pretty odd surname and Ziva always referred to him by that whenever she was revealing them with tales of Tony's stunts in work. But it was best to check. If it was, then Amelia could completely understand why Ziva was so out of sorts during the last game and she felt a little bit guilty over barging into her apartment. She scrolled through the article, eyes widening more and more as she got further into it. What on earth?

Her phone chose that moment to beep. She jumped and snatched it up quickly, hoping it was Ziva. Nope. Amelia sighed. Just her husband. She was about to put it back down when she realised that she should probably read and answer his text.

A quick text directing him that yes, he needed to return to the shop he just left to get the pizzas for tonight sorted that.

Of course, just as she was getting to the part about the investigation around it her phone beeped _again_.

"He better not be asking me _where_ the pizzas are," she muttered, expecting another text from her husband.

Okay, she was being a bit unfair. He actually _was_ good at grocery shopping - he did it as much as she did for God's sake - but he immediately got confused if the stores changed their layout in any way.

Amelia tapped her phone screen to open her texts. Oh, it was Ziva. She blinked and almost stopped her phone in her eagerness to open the message. _It was Ziva!_

Yes

One-word reply. Amelia frowned at the screen, half expecting more messages to come through. She knew that if someone was checking the name of _her_ boss and that person didn't work with her, _she_ would be asking a lot of questions. But the questions didn't come.

Deciding to give Ziva a chance to say more if she wanted, Amelia returned to the article. Which only gave her even _more_ questions.

Hmmm. It looked like Ziva wasn't going to ask anything else so maybe Amelia could. Now, what was the best way to ask 'Did your boss seriously get blown up'? Followed closely by 'How the hell did he survive'?

* * *

Ziva eyed her phone suspiciously, expecting it to beep again. She suspected that Amelia had a lot of questions. Questions she didn't know if she wanted to answer or not but she was still feeling on edge about being asked. Which was ridiculous because it was up to her if she wanted to answer or not and she was sure that Amelia would not mind if she refused to answer any questions. And she was going to. Refuse to answer. Ziva could barely make her _thoughts_ on the past week or so coherent, never mind if she tried to explain it. Her English would definitely fail her and it would come out as a jumbled mess. And that was something she wanted to avoid. She was self-conscious enough about her English as it was (though she'd never admit it). That wouldn't help.

Why wasn't Amelia replying? Why was she even asking about Gibbs? She had never met the man.

"And is never going to," Ziva grumbled and mumbled something foul about Gibbs' 'retirement'.

Her phone finally beeped and she jumped despite knowing it was coming. Which annoyed her, she shouldn't be on an edge over a _text_ of all things. The explosion, yes. Almost losing a colleague, yes. But not a silly text that wasn't even bringing bad news. She was so _stupid_. America was definitely making her soft.

Scoffing at herself, Ziva grabbed her cell phone and opened the text.

I'm here if you want to talk

A smile lifted the corners of her mouth. Yes, Ziva knew it was probably just used as a nice sentiment and she definitely wouldn't be taking Amelia up on that matter but, well, it was nice of Amelia to say so.

Friends were quite nice people to have.


	18. Game 5: Missing the Game

**AN: This is set in S4 E1 Shalom**

Today really wasn't going to well for her. Ziva would be the first to admit that. Just not to anybody else. But she could admit that to herself. Being tracked down by the FBI, she kind of _had_ to. Facing the truths of your situation meant that you had more of an opportunity to come on top. And she always came out on top. Sometimes only after leaving a literal trail of bodies in her wake but still on top.

Ziva did not exactly consider being on the run from the Israeli embassy, her father and the FBI as being 'on top'. Or being anywhere remotely close to it.

She took a deep, steadying breath, trying to calm her extremely shaken nerves. It somewhat worked, though she could still feel the adrenaline pumping through her veins.

This was definitely _not_ how Ziva had planned her day out. No. Not at all. It was meant to be a _simple_ sort of day. Go on her pre-work run, then to work, wind Tony up with McGee, hopefully have a case to prevent a 'campfire' and then meet up for a scrabble game (and hopefully win this one). See? Simple.

It did not even go anywhere near that. Okay, she did manage to go for her run. It had been a good run, one of her favourite routes in fact. Then she was doing the whole driving to work thing. That was sort of interrupted by witnessing an _assassination_ by a _Mossad_ Officer of all things. Ziva was not so naive to think that there weren't Israeli operatives on American soil but she was surprised for one of them to do something so blatant. Officer Eschel was _Mossad_, for crying out loud! They were meant to be sneaky, undetectable. Like a ninja, as Tony would say. Not carry out an assassination in broad daylight while on allied soil!

Oh, she would really like to be confronting Namir right about now but _no_, she had to be in hiding instead. Stupid FBI. Stupid Israeli Embassy.

Speaking of the Israeli Embassy, or rather, Officer Bashan, that was something else that she had to deal with. It was not as urgent as her current situation but something had to be done about it. Her father could not be _spying_ on her and just expect to get away with it!

Fiddling with the pieces of her phone, Ziva pulled a face at it. She did not want to think of how many texts and phone calls she had missed but she couldn't exactly leave her phone on. McGee had proved that even having the battery _in_ the phone was enough to track someone. And she certainly did not want to be tracked. Though, having the team know where she was would be...

No. Ziva shook her head to stop that line of thinking. The team could _not_ know where she was. They would want to help and she was not going to let them get into trouble on her behalf. And they would. This situation was a whole lot bigger than NCIS.

Not that Ziva knew what to make of the situation anymore. She had been convinced, _so convinced_, that her father was behind the assassination, even if Mossad "officially" wasn't. Her little trip to the Israeli Embassy had confused that matter. She wasn't sure who to believe. Bashan looked and sounded so earnest but he still could be lying. Anyone would lie for her father. He was Eli David. You did as you were told when it came to him. And Bashan was his man.

She was going to have to move soon. It was not a good thing to stay in one place for too long when you were a fugitive. An _alleged_ fugitive, she corrected. Either way, she should not let her guard slip, not forget her training.

She would not be contacting anyone. Not one of her scrabble friends nor NCIS. Even an innocent text saying she wouldn't be making the game tonight was far too risky.

Was it strange that the only thing she felt regretful about was the definite possibility of missing a silly scrabble game? It was quite ridiculous how she was starting to depend on these games. They were becoming a habit even if they didn't really have a routine. And habits were not good things to have in her profession. It made you exposed. Kind of like making a word that very obviously could make many other words by other players.

Ziva made an impatient noise and shook her head. Thinking about scrabble was not something she should be doing! It was pointless. Extremely so as it was in no way a priority right now.

The priority was figuring out how to clear her name and apprehend Eschel. The order of which that happened in was unimportant. Although, having her name cleared would lessen the chances of her getting shot, which was always a good thing. The only problem was that she could not think of _how_ to get both of those things done without contacting NCIS.

"S'Emek!" she swore, hands twitching as if she wanted to strangle something.

Which she did. Preferably Eschel.

But she did not know how she was going to be able to do that. She had no idea of his whereabouts or what he might be planning next. No way of tracking gim down without NCIS resources. She could not just go out there and start looking! There had to be a plan!

Another growl of frustration left her as she dropped the pieces of her phone. Thankfully, it didn't break. Absentmindedly, Ziva slotted it back together.

What she needed was something or someone like NCIS, or who thought like NCIS, who could be trusted. Who could help her.

She eyed her phone, now complete in her hand. Maybe there was one call she could make. Just one. Or more like two. It was a large shot, a final resort, but she was getting desperate.

And she would rather like to make that scrabble game.


	19. Game 5: Where is She?

"She's probably just busy at work," Fakhir tried to reassure them all as Amelia lifted her phone for the seventh time in nearly as many minutes.

It hadn't even beeped or vibrated with a notification this time. She was starting to imagine things which really wasn't a good sign.

"Or, she has been murdered," Francisca added in an unhelpful dramatic manner.

Everyone gave her a look, varying from exasperated to disturbed.

"Really? That's where your mind goes?" Amelia demanded.

"It is possible!"

"She _is_ a federal agent with a gun. She could _technically_ get shot by a suspect," Fakhir decided to point out.

Well, yes that was true but Amelia would really rather not think of that. The idea of any of her friends dying was not something she wanted to consider. No thank you. She glared at the man so he wouldn't continue with that train of thought.

"No more talk of injuries or death," Amelia said firmly.

She didn't want to tempt fate or anything.

"Speaking of death," Francisca began. "Did you hear about the shooting that happened not far from here? The news is saying that it was done by a foreign intelligence agency."

"Bah," Fakhir waved his hand dismissively. "The news, it always exaggerates such things."

"About a foreign agency?" Francisca asked incredulously.

"About anything," was Fakhir's response. "An American person who looked foreign probably shot someone. The news likes to be dramatic."

"But it tells the truth!" Francisca argued.

Francisca was the type of person who believed everything the news reported on, no matter how farfetched or ridiculous. Amelia didn't even discuss certain events with the woman anymore or she'd just get a pack of lies the news had been spouting. The woman didn't even watch _reliable_ news sources, she liked the gossipy ones, the drama inducing ones. It could be very annoying to listen to. Though, Amelia _did_ appreciate celebrity gossip that Francisca discovered before her.

But back on topic. Ziva. Who was decidedly not here and also not talking to any of them. Just one more check of her phone.

Before she could lift it, Fakhir snatched it away from her.

"Hey!"

That was hers!

"You aren't going to call her again," he said firmly.

"I wasn't going to phone her," she replied quite truthfully.

She had been going to text. Far less disappointing than getting a recorded voice or beeping back. Fakhir gave her a look. A look she didn't appreciate thank you very much. It was a look of complete disbelief. She wasn't _lying_.

"Or text her," he added for good measure.

Amelia deflated at that, but only briefly.

"I was going to text my husband," she tried.

Actually, that wasn't a bad idea. She needed to know if he was grabbing food for the kids while they were out or if she had to cook something. Or order something in. Probably order something in. She didn't want to start cooking with everyone here. Correction, she didn't want to start cooking with _Francisca_ here. The woman always turned her nose up at the "lack of flavours" in her food. _She_ didn't have a toddler who would only eat dry cereal if she let him.

"Uh huh."

There was that disbelieving tone again. The two of them started at each other, willing the other to give in. Amelia was the first to do so, unfortunately.

"Okay, I was just going to text Ziva."

"Amelia-"

"Only one more time, though."

Fakhir still didn't give her back her phone so Amelia decided to take matters into her own hands. Literally. She tried to snatch her phone back from him but he was quicker. And taller. He was holding it over his head, far out of her reach. Why did men _do_ that?

"Can we start the game," Liu asked, casually watching the drama unfold while nibbling on some nuts.

She had promptly laid claim to the whole bowl of them once she entered the kitchen and no one had felt brave enough to take them away from her. The student was clutching them very tightly to her chest. Best just to leave her to them. There were plenty of other snacks.

"Not until we're all here," Amelia said with a tone of finality and crossing her arms, giving up on retrieving her phone.

They didn't need to be so impatient. Sometimes it took them an age to get started on the game as they are and gossiped and in general had fun talking to each other. Why couldn't they do that today? But _no_, today everyone came with their game faces on, determined to win.

"Look, she isn't going to show up. Or she's going to be late," Liu said matter-of-factly. "Either way, it is her own fault if she misses a game."

"Just a few more minutes," Amelia cajoled, picking up her phone. "Let me call her one more time."

"I already did that," Francisca reminded her.

"Yes, but I don't think she will understand the shrieking Spanish message you left her," she replied in a dry tone.

The older woman just shrugged and waved her hand dismissively.

"She speaks my language. She will understand."

Amelia gave her a doubtful look, she wasn't too sure what Francisca spewed out was actually words, and dialled Ziva's number. Again. No answer. Again. Not even her voicemail message this time, which was odd. Maybe her battery was dead or something? But surely, she would still call? It was all very suspicious in her opinion and no one else seemed to think so. This was not Ziva-like behaviour, couldn't they see that?

Fakhir's face softened and he gave her a sympathetic look.

"If we do not hear from her at the end of the night we can go round to her house," he suggested.

Another intervention? Amelia didn't know if Ziva would appreciate that. What if she actually was okay? What if she was just really busy like everyone had been saying? What if she was sleeping? Oh, Amelia was having second thoughts about this.

"Come on, I thought you wanted to speak to her," Fakhir said slightly impatiently when Amelia didn't say anything.

"We don't need to go to her house," Amelia replied hesitantly.

It felt like they would be crossing a line doing that. They weren't worried for her mental state or anything like last time.

"I will go to her house" Francisca offered. "Knock down her door."

"Knock _on_ her door," Amelia corrected.

"I meant what I said."


	20. Over Tea

Ziva tapped her fingers impatiently on the table and immediately felt guilty for doing so. It wasn't like Amelia was late - she was just early, having completely misjudged how quickly she would be able to walk around a set of roadworks. And she practically had an hour as well, so there was no real rush.

They had actually been given the opportunity to have a full lunch hour today. No active cases, just reports. After several shenanigans, Gibbs told them all to "get out of the office and don't come back until lunch is over". Well, she, Tony and Tim weren't going to argue with that and they had rushed to the elevator before he could change his mind.

Tony was meeting up with one of his frat buddies for some sort of greasy imitation of a sandwich, Tim was going to a computer shop - he wanted to upgrade _something_ (he had told them what but it was followed by so many technical words that she had now forgotten) and she actually had plans as well. Plans that she had made herself.

Speaking of plans, Ziva looked up from her water to see Amelia slide into the chair opposite her and smiled.

"Hi."

"Hello, Amelia."

"Have you already ordered?" Amelia asked, nodding at Ziva's glass.

Ziva shook her head.

"It is just a glass of water," she explained.

"Good, I'm not late then."

Ziva shook her head. "I am just early," she explained.

"Shocking."

Ziva rolled her eyes but did not deny it, she was rarely the first one to any "coffee date" because of work (Gibbs).

Eyeing the display case by the counter, Amelia said, "Those traybakes look amazing."

"I was more thinking the cinnamon rolls," Ziva disagreed.

"Are you sure they would be cinnamon-y enough for you?" Amelia teased.

Ziva's love of the spice was well known. It was just a perfect flavour, okay? And there seemed to be a depressingly small amount of foods with a food amount of it in it. Apparently, only winter was an acceptable time for cinnamon goodies to come out. And yes, late D.C autumn was winter in her books. Stupid weather.

"I am sure I will cope."

"You'll just have to wait until Hallowe'en for your tea."

Ziva grumbled something under her breath. It really wasn't fair. Spices should not be seasonal in her opinion.

"I can at least get it in a roll," she said, nodding towards the display case and reaching for her bag. Amelia held up a hand to stop her.

"My treat."

Ziva nodded her acquiescence and settled back down into her seat. There was no point in arguing with that tone.

"Usual order?" Amelia checked.

"Please."

It did not take long for Amelia to return; the queue was short and nobody was hesitating at the counter. A steaming mug of berry blast tea was set in front of her and a plate of assorted treats was placed in the centre of the table. Ziva raised an eyebrow, there were more than two cakes there.

"I couldn't decide," she said defensively.

"That is -" Ziva tried to count the cakes. "- a lot."

She didn't think that Amelia could eat all of them. Ziva knew she certainly couldn't. Far too much sugar.

"You're helping me."

Ziva raised an eyebrow. "I am."

"Of course," Amelia replied confidently. "I even got you a slice of apple pie. There's cinnamon in it."

Oh, that sparked her interest.

"There is?"

"I asked." Amelia looked around the table and then patted herself down. "Dammit. Forgot the sugar. Do you need any milk?"

Ziva shook her head as Amelia rose to retrieve some sugar from the counter. There was a little container of paper packets there.

"So," Amelia stated, settling back into her seat and dumping a handful of white and brown sugar packets onto the table. "How are things going?"

Ziva took a long sip of her tea before answering. She hissed slightly from the heat.

"Good."

That got Amelia sceptically raising an eyebrow.

"Really?"

"Yes."

"You're...good?"

Now it was Ziva's turn to raise an eyebrow. "That is what I said, yes?"

Amelia gave her a long look, searching for something in her face that she didn't find, before shaking her head.

"Yes, because being uncontactable for several days is 'good'." Her tone veering on scathing.

Ziva bit her lip so she didn't laugh at Amelia's indignant expression. Then her mouth turned down into a frown, remembering the events that had _made_ her uncontactable for a few days.

Amelia noticed her expression and hastily added, "Not that it's really a bad thing. I mean, you don't _have_ to contact people. It's just that-"

Ziva held up a hand to stop her babbling.

"You were worried, correct?"

Amelia's shoulders slumped in relief, apparently worried that Ziva was going to snap at her. Ziva didn't exactly blame her, she hadn't exactly been approachable even before everything happened. Though it was... odd to have Amelia worry about her. She didn't exactly understand why. It wasn't like Ziva being missing would affect Amelia in any way. She understood the team at NCIS - they would be a person down and she liked to believe she brought some new, indispensable skills to the counter - but not Amelia. What did it matter if she vanished? She turned up again, didn't she? Uninjured to shoe.

"When people you know disappear without saying anything people tend to be worried," Amelia told her, reading her puzzled expression correctly.

That still didn't explain anything to Ziva. In fact, it made her feel more confused. Why would she be worried?

"But I am okay."

Amelia made an exasperated noise.

"I can see that _now_. I didn't know that then. None of us did, Ziva! It's never a good thing when people disappear!"

"You have been watching too many crime shows again," Ziva deflected

Her friend made a frustrated noise this time.

"No, well, yes. But that's not the point!"

Ziva gave her a long look, a realisation suddenly hitting her.

"You… care about what happens to me?"

Amelia's eyes softened.

"Of course, I do."


End file.
